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On international applications of Lojban



The following was posted to Auxlang mailing list by Paul Bartlett.  I have 
been trying for months to figure a way to explain why I support the 
European Patent usage of Lojban, but have not been willing to commit 
significant resources to selling the idea.  Besides having a dictionary to 
do, that is ...

This sums up one of my major concerns, as to why Lojban as a community may 
not be quite ready for adoption, even if we can show a good and useful 
translation of a patent.  Maybe people can be looking at what we need to do 
in order to be able to promote the use of Lojban other than as a toy or as 
a medium of personal expression (both of these are worthwhile in 
themselves, but surely are not all that is possible for the language).

 >Date:    Fri, 24 Dec 1999 12:36:50 -0500
 >From:    Paul O Bartlett <bartlett@SMART.NET>
 >Subject: Re: Artificiality, was (Difficulty of Learning Languages)
 >
 >On Fri, 24 Dec 1999, Kjell Rehnström wrote (very tiny excerpt):
 >
 >>                         Where are the teachers?
 >
 >    This brings up a significant problem for the spread and use of
 >constructed auxiliary languages.  There seem to be two approaches
 >to the matter, although these two approaches are not necessarily
 >incompatible.
 >
 >    There are those who take a sort of bottom-up approach.  People
 >should learn IAL X as individuals and club together (if they choose),
 >informally or somewhat formally in associations.  Thus, it is believed,
 >an IAL will spread as time goes by.
 >
 >    Others favor a sort of top-down approach.  They adovcate adoption
 >of IAL X by some sort of international or quasi-international body.
 >One that most frequently comes to mind is the European Union, with its
 >staggering costs for translation and interpreting services.  There
 >could, of course, be other bodies which might conceivably adopt a
 >conIAL, such as some agency of the United Nations.
 >
 >    Although I think that the top-down approach would be a marvelous
 >thing, it does have a problem: as Kjell said, "Where are the teachers?"
 >If some body were to adopt a conIAL, I presume that they would want to
 >be able to get up to speed with it relatively quickly and would want
 >accuracy in it use.  This implies the need for teachers and teaching
 >materials.  Also, I think it likely that before such an auxlang would
 >be adopted, the potential adoptors would want assurance that the
 >proposed interlanguage would be up to the job.
 >
 >    Where are the teachers?  Well, Esperanto could probably supply many
 >of them for instruction in many countries, and I would assess that it
 >is adequate for the task (although the supersigned letter definitely
 >work to its disfavor).  Latin, strictly speaking, of course, is not a
 >constructed IAL, but it has been proposed as an international language
 >again, once adequate terminology has been added for modern things and
 >concepts.  There might be enough teachers to do the job, and Latin has
 >a proven track record.  However, one difficulty with Latin is that I do
 >not myself foresee everyday diplomats using it conversationally (where
 >a lot of real work gets done) and in formal debates and discussions.
 >Then again, one idea is that an auxlang not be used so much in debates
 >as an intermediary or so-called pivot language for documents and
 >translations.
 >
 >    Are any others of today's proposed (con)IALs up to the job in the
 >sense of having enough teachers and being adequate to the task?  To be
 >honest, I am skeptical.  For instance, I like IALA Interlingua, but I
 >don't know if there are enough teachers and adequate didactic materials
 >in enough languages to be up to the job.  I really doubt that at this
 >time any other conIAL has much of a realistic chance for consideration
 >for top-down adoption, whatever its respective merits might be.  Ido I
 >also like, and Occidental is interesting, but I honestly doubt that
 >either of them has much chance at all for a top-down adoption.  Other
 >languages?  I don't think so.
 >
 >    Thus, I think that the only conIAL with much likelihood for formal
 >or quasi-formal adoption is Esperanto, with Interlingua a distant
 >second.  And one of the major hurdles, for Esperanto, Interlingua, or
 >XYZ, is that so many people simply do not take seriously at all the
 >very idea of a constructed auxiliary.
 >
 >    Of course, there is nothing at all wrong with bottom-up, and
 >nothing says that an auxlang has to be adopted formally for it still to
 >be useful.  But, as Mike Farris has pointed out, we have yet to see any
 >conIAL, including Esperanto, used much for business contracts, other
 >commercial dealings, scientific papers, or whatever (although
 >Interlingua was once used partially for scientific abstracts).  Thus,
 >all of them remain largely in the realm of hobby.  Whether the
 >bottom-up approach will be adequate in the long run reamins to be seen.
 >
 >--
 >Paul                                  <bartlett@smart.net>
 >..........................................................
 >Paul O. Bartlett, P.O. Box 857, Vienna, VA 22183-0857, USA
 >Keyserver (0xF383C8F9) or WWW for PGP public key
 >Home Page:  http://www.smart.net/~bartlett

----
lojbab                     ***NOTE NEW ADDRESS***           lojbab@lojban.org
Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA               703-385-0273
Artificial language Loglan/Lojban:
   see Lojban WWW Server: href=" http://xiron.pc.helsinki.fi/lojban/ "
   Order _The Complete Lojban Language_ - see our Web pages or ask me.